As you've heard, there's a lot wrong with this movie. But there's a lot right with it too, which explains the $800m box office it's closing in on as I write these words.

It's Michael Jackson's life from the time he's little growing up in Gary, Indiana, press ganged into being a performer by his domineering father Joe (Colman Domingo) right up until one of his London concerts in 1988 to promote Bad. As the final few frames promise – and no surprises, considering the box office – his story will continue.

I'm actually slightly more interested in how they'll depict the rest of Jackson's journey in the sequel, because the onset of the 90s was where everything went wrong for him, from the molestation claims that dogged him the rest of his life to the forgotten albums and performances that didn't hold a candle to his cultural potency in the 80s (does anyone remember Dangerous or Invincible?)

But this is a very gilded portrait of his upbringing and rise to stardom, and Bohemian Rhapsody producer Graham King's brief to director Antoine Fuqua was probably similar here; include the iconic music, outfits, moments, etc, some hack writer will fill in the connective tissues between it and none of it has to be true.

And that's the first problem – it's very unchallenging. Two potentially weighty themes (a kid who never grew up because he never had a childhood himself, an artist trying to escape the iron grip of his father and be his own man) should be pivotal to a dramatic retelling of Jackson's story, but as soon as the script veers towards them it shies away to mount another toe tapping moment filled with the energy and the music.

Every time Michael tries to stand up to the man he's terrified of (whether it's getting his first plastic surgery or firing him as his manager) there are no real consequences that justified his fear. There's one scene of Joe thrashing Michael with his belt as a little kid and that't it – in real life I understand Joe beat them all, including their mother.

Then there's Miles Teller as Jackson's longtime lawyer John Branca, who gets a single grandstanding moment in the script when Jackson favours his brash approach in favour of a room full of fusty but more experienced lawyers but isn't given anything else to do in the movie. Why does the character exist and get a hero moment? Look no further than the credits, where the real Branca is listed as an exec producer.

But what it gets right, it really gets right. Like the track building towards the bass drop in a nightclub, you can feel the iconic moments getting ready to appear, and when they do, the movie punches the air triumphantly simply because of the power they still hold in our imaginations.

The Cliff Notes version would include Jackson asking an AD to get John Landis to shoot his entire length in the Thriller zombie dance sequence so the audience can see his feet, the famous move he pops during the chorus of Beat It and the moonwalk during the 1983 Grammys performance of Billie Jean, and the film does too. That stuff is what you're there for, not a deep character study.

Jafaar Jackson, the singer's real life nephew, is a standout, probably looking like him because of genetics but getting the dances, the lilting voice and even the way he holds a microphone just right.

But finally, you can't talk about the film and ignore the controversy of it not including the paedophile accusations. One of the guys who accused Jackson who appeared in that Netflix documentary had it in his contract his story was never allowed to be told in a fictionalised version of Jackson's life, which infamously led to the entire third act being rewritten and reshot.

But if you think there's no concession to it in the film, just watch the studio and production company idents at the beginning. When the walking, bejewelled socks launch into that toe-standing thing from the old MJJ Productions Logo, the animation reveals the company's actually called Optimum Productions now. An attempt to distance the whole Jackson enterprise from a sordid past? You decide... or wait until a much braver director is prepared to tell the next chapter, warts and all.